Jose Mourinho's Best XI of all time

There is a personal touch to all the teams Jose Mourinho has managed, such that he is one of the few football coaches in the world who can be called auteurs. The selection policy he follows is often strangely nuanced too. His teams defend hard and strong, have some good passers in the midfield, and have a lone goal-poaching striker as the most prolific source of goals hovering around the opponent’s penalty box. Those players who do not fit into this scheme of things, even if they are exceptionally talented, are not valued very highly by Mourinho. Cases in point – Juan Mata and David Luiz.This is an attempt to get into the mind of the ‘Special One’, something he is himself famous because of the mind games he plays, and select for him a team of dreams. For all his whimsicalness, Mourinho has gathered around him a cult of loyal players, some who have followed him from club to club. When Samuel Eto’o was asked why he was joining Chelsea even when he was receiving better financial deals from other places, he replied,”Those other places do not have Jose Mourinho”. He has managed to acquire individuals who have fitted into his plan easily, non-exceptional players who have followed their manager’s orders and found it reaping success. Deco(who followed him from Porto to Chelsea), Diego Milito(Inter Milan) and Oscar(Chelsea) make up the hypothetical bench for this hypothetical team. These Mourinhistas line up in a 4-3-3 formation. 

#1 Petr Cech

Petr Cech was one of the first batch of people Mourinho brought to Chelsea when he joined in 2004, as part of his grand plans of world conquest. He has been a dependable presence at the Blues goal for the ensuing decade, but it was during the first three years that Cech’s rise to the top seemed instrumental to a similar turn in Chelsea’s destiny. 

Cech was adjudged the best goalkeeper in the Champions League for three years straight, and it was in that tournament that Chelsea announced their arrival as a superpower. Cech holds the Premier League record for requiring the least number of matches to reach 100 clean sheets – 180. In his first season, he went for 1025 minutes without conceding a goal, a record which stood till Edwin van der Sar beat him by a few minutes during the 2009-10 season.